Providing Spatial Navigation for the World Wide Web

The World Wide Web (WWW) is a rapidly growing distributed hypertext on the Internet. This paper presents a way to enable users to navigate the WWW spatially by providing a spatial user interface metaphor in a textual virtual environment. This may help users to orient themselves in the masses of information available. The term "spatial navigation" stresses the fact that the structure of the information space is made explicit in this type of navigation whereas hypertext itself, and especially the WWW tend to hide this structure. We review common navigational strategies on the WWW and point out how these strategies indirectly make use of the underlying structure of the information space. Whereas hypertexts hide their structure, virtual environments explicitly show it. We outline navigational differences between hypertexts and (textual) virtual environments and describe a way to combine the advantages of both. In our system, presently implemented at the Georgia Institute of Technology, a textual virtual environment is combined with the WWW to create a mirror space to a part of the WWW. Navigating this virtual environment users also navigate the WWW, but in a spatial way. The system supports interaction between users and therefore collaborative navigation. This allows conducting guided tours and describing paths to information vaguely, like in real environments.